I just had a tech out today to fix a cable card channel tuning issue (long story) and they said the Tuning Resolvers were in Employee Alpha, which means, if the stars align we may see them within 6 months. Wooo!

Same thing here in the OKC market. I ended up calling Cox because 790 (HBOHD) wasn't showing up. All he could suggest was as truck roll. Later that evening I thought to check and see if the channel had changed and sure enough 800 was listed in the channel list page, but with no guide data. Later on I got the message about the update and everything's fine now.
Ticked me off that the CSR had no idea that they had just moved their premium channels.

I am with cox in San Diego. I have a Tivo HD with a multistream card installed that started having issues after 4 weeks. Tivo is sending a replacement unit. When I get
the replacement will I have to get a cox tech to come out to "install" the cable card in the replacement Tivo? It seems to me the only thing the tech did the first time that I couldn't do was physically bring me the card. Since I already have a card I would like to avoid having a tech come out especially if it will result in another installation fee. Can I get the card paired with the new Tivo over the phone?

Ticked me off that the CSR had no idea that they had just moved their premium channels.

On Wednesday, the tech who was correcting a botched cablecard install didn't even know that it had been moved. We were both looking for my HBO HD on 790 and trying to figure out why it wasn't working. Luckily I had my Cox DVR still connected due to the botched CableCard install and we figured out that it had been moved.

<sarcasm>The level of communication at Cox is amazing. </sarcasm>

However, Tivo DID already have the lineup change but hadn't pushed it out to everyone yet.

I am with cox in San Diego. I have a Tivo HD with a multistream card installed that started having issues after 4 weeks. Tivo is sending a replacement unit. When I get
the replacement will I have to get a cox tech to come out to "install" the cable card in the replacement Tivo? It seems to me the only thing the tech did the first time that I couldn't do was physically bring me the card. Since I already have a card I would like to avoid having a tech come out especially if it will result in another installation fee. Can I get the card paired with the new Tivo over the phone?

It's possible, but the likelihood of a CSR knowing how to do it is pretty low - about on par with the sun going supernova in the next year

Generally, the techs have access to better trained/more knowledgeable folks back at the call center who can do the pairing, activation, and validation.

just got a tivo hd, had cox come and install cablecards, worked great until i repeated guided setup and then channels like usaHD, TNTHD all disappeared, so i called cox and they sent a pulse which once again fixed problem for a fex minutes. at that point had cox send out a tech. he arrived and proceeded to tell me some very interesting things:
1. cable cards a going to be gone within the year......apparently cox sued fcc and won, so they are going bye bye
2. cox and tivo are going to give birth to a coxtivo dvr box in the next 2 yrs...
3. apparently cox can send encryption directly to tivohd...only issue is that technically the tivohd is cox's property until when you move or change service you have to bring tivo into cox to have encryption removed...
4. Cox tech have absolutely no idea how to work with cable card.

just got a tivo hd, had cox come and install cablecards, worked great until i repeated guided setup and then channels like usaHD, TNTHD all disappeared, so i called cox and they sent a pulse which once again fixed problem for a fex minutes. at that point had cox send out a tech. he arrived and proceeded to tell me some very interesting things:
1. cable cards a going to be gone within the year......apparently cox sued fcc and won, so they are going bye bye
2. cox and tivo are going to give birth to a coxtivo dvr box in the next 2 yrs...
3. apparently cox can send encryption directly to tivohd...only issue is that technically the tivohd is cox's property until when you move or change service you have to bring tivo into cox to have encryption removed...
4. Cox tech have absolutely no idea how to work with cable card.

Christian
Tivo HD
SA 8300HD
Cox Fairfax

I would say the tech has no idea what they were talking about. If Cox did infact sue the FCC and won wouldn't you think cox would have made an anoucement? The only cox property is the cable card.

just got a tivo hd, had cox come and install cablecards, worked great until i repeated guided setup and then channels like usaHD, TNTHD all disappeared, so i called cox and they sent a pulse which once again fixed problem for a fex minutes. at that point had cox send out a tech. he arrived and proceeded to tell me some very interesting things:
1. cable cards a going to be gone within the year......apparently cox sued fcc and won, so they are going bye bye
2. cox and tivo are going to give birth to a coxtivo dvr box in the next 2 yrs...
3. apparently cox can send encryption directly to tivohd...only issue is that technically the tivohd is cox's property until when you move or change service you have to bring tivo into cox to have encryption removed...
4. Cox tech have absolutely no idea how to work with cable card.

Christian
Tivo HD
SA 8300HD
Cox Fairfax

That tech was completely and utterly full of BS.

1) CableCard is not going anywhere (it was developed by CableLABS - a consortium put together by the MSOs), if COX even attempted to stop using CableCards on their own they would be sued by customers and the FCC so fast their heads would spin.

2) There has been no formal annoucement of any TiVo/COX relationship. I am pretty sure COX would issue a press release to this effect before telling an installer!

3) COX has no rights to your personal property. EVER!
They only have the ability to send decryption information to THEIR CableCards, which the TiVo passes via their Coax RF to the CableCards. They have no ability to control the TiVo in any way, shape, or form.

4) In general, yes.. COX is very disorganized in the CableCard department!

just got a tivo hd, had cox come and install cablecards, worked great until i repeated guided setup and then channels like usaHD, TNTHD all disappeared, so i called cox and they sent a pulse which once again fixed problem for a fex minutes. at that point had cox send out a tech. he arrived and proceeded to tell me some very interesting things:
1. cable cards a going to be gone within the year......apparently cox sued fcc and won, so they are going bye bye
2. cox and tivo are going to give birth to a coxtivo dvr box in the next 2 yrs...
3. apparently cox can send encryption directly to tivohd...only issue is that technically the tivohd is cox's property until when you move or change service you have to bring tivo into cox to have encryption removed...
4. Cox tech have absolutely no idea how to work with cable card.

Christian
Tivo HD
SA 8300HD
Cox Fairfax

most of the HD channels above 721 are now all SDV (about 20 of them) including for example USAHD, so no matter what they do you will not receive them until the tuning adapter arrives.

Be sure to let me know if you do somehow start gettting a few of those though...

Announced this week, Cox has to support Cable Card users and provide full content or else provide compensation to those Cable Card Users for content not received.

Expert from a recent fine to Cox.

39. Thus, we order Cox, within ninety (90) days of this NAL and Order, to
issue refunds to CableCARD customers affected by the October 16, 2007
implementation of SDV in its Fairfax County, Virginia cable system.
Specifically, Cox must provide refunds as follows:

a. For former CableCARD customers that began to lease any set-top boxes
from Cox following notice of a possible SDV deployment, Cox must
refund the difference in cost (if any) between the charges for the Cox
set-top boxes and the CableCARDs previously leased by such customers;
and

b. For CableCARD customers that kept their CableCARDs even after notice
of the SDV deployment, Cox must refund the customers' subscriber fees
based on the diminished value of their service following the movement
of linear programming to an SDV platform and reduce their rates on a
going-forward basis accordingly.

I just a had a successful TiVo HD install in Hampton Roads, Virginia. I asked for M-Cards on the phone with the CSR, and they did not think they had any. The tech showed up on time with 4 M-Cards in his hand. He was very nice and knew his stuff. He had done several TiVo installs. The first 2 M-Cards were bad - they would not pull any channels, but the 3rd one worked great. He knew enough from previous installs that if a card did not work at first, he just moved on the the next one without wasting time troubleshooting. He was there for about an hour total. I'm thriled to have TiVo back in my life!

I get all of the HD channels except for the 3 junky ones we have in the 800's here (Green Channel, Hallmark movies, and some other "Things No Male Human Being Could Ever Watch" network.) They are adding 5 new HD's next week, all in the 700's, so it will be intersting to see if they show up.

39. Thus, we order Cox, within ninety (90) days of this NAL and Order, to
issue refunds to CableCARD customers affected by the October 16, 2007
implementation of SDV in its Fairfax County, Virginia cable system.
Specifically, Cox must provide refunds as follows:

I already jumped ship but I wonder if I'll get a partial refund This was the specific reason I gave them as to why I was bailing...

Not sure if anyone here would be able to answer this, but I don't exactly trust cox CSR's to give straight answers so I figured i'd try here first.

I have two TivoHD's with cable cards, working just peachy. I was looking through cox services offered on their sight and looking at my cox bill and became interested in this $7 a month "Digital Service" charge. When I looked up what digital service is on their site they claim it to be On Screen Interactive Program Guide, PPV Access, and Digital Music Channels. When I looked further however, on their HD offering it says HD requires digital service. I'm just wondering what might happen and what I might lose if I drop the digital service since its made up of two functions I cannot use with Tivo and the digital music is worthless to me since I have XM.

By chance does anyone have experiences with this? Are they ripping me off on this $7 digital service now that I have tivo with CCs? This is cox santa barbara if anyone knows specifics in that area.

Not sure if anyone here would be able to answer this, but I don't exactly trust cox CSR's to give straight answers so I figured i'd try here first.

...

By chance does anyone have experiences with this? Are they ripping me off on this $7 digital service now that I have tivo with CCs? This is cox santa barbara if anyone knows specifics in that area.

Well I am a Cox CSR in Virginia, but I'm pretty sure that this is standard across all markets. There is an option to have limited digital services without paying the digital access fees. It's refered to as 'Buy Through' and it is required by the FCC so that customers, in markets where premium services and PPV are digital only can, order these services without paying for things they do not want. I'm fairly certain that CableCARD falls under this, but HD premiums, and HD expanded channels are not included in that.

Without knowing what channels you currently have I don't know how that would affect you, but seeing that you have the cards in the TiVo I'll assume that you would likely lose a fair number of the channels that you got the HD TiVo for.

Well I am a Cox CSR in Virginia, but I'm pretty sure that this is standard across all markets. There is an option to have limited digital services without paying the digital access fees. It's refered to as 'Buy Through' and it is required by the FCC so that customers, in markets where premium services and PPV are digital only can, order these services without paying for things they do not want. I'm fairly certain that CableCARD falls under this, but HD premiums, and HD expanded channels are not included in that.

Without knowing what channels you currently have I don't know how that would affect you, but seeing that you have the cards in the TiVo I'll assume that you would likely lose a fair number of the channels that you got the HD TiVo for.

Jody, any news on the tuning adapter? dunno if you saw the other thread where i posted my email thread w/ Cox csrs, but there's a lot of nothing in their knowledge base in regards to the TA...

Jody, any news on the tuning adapter? dunno if you saw the other thread where i posted my email thread w/ Cox csrs, but there's a lot of nothing in their knowledge base in regards to the TA...

Nope, and nope. This is the only thread I'm still following here. As for the adapters since the sighting of them back in June/July I haven't heard peep one. I asked one of the two supervisors in my department that know anything about them at all, last week, and he just shrugged with his 'f*ck if I know' shrug.

This is by no means official, and is totally my observation, but it seems as though the company is trying to hold out until Tru2Way stuff comes out and just skim over first gen CableCARD all together. I don't think the FCC will let them, and I hope I'm wrong. It's just the feeling I'm getting with how little information is out there, and the run around I get any time I try to get answers from anyone outside of my department.

I'd love to get a S3, but I'm not going to until I'm sure everything is going to work, and right now I can't say that; and my market hasn't even launched SDV yet.

This is by no means official, and is totally my observation, but it seems as though the company is trying to hold out until Tru2Way stuff comes out and just skim over first gen CableCARD all together.

I don't think so since at least in my market (Cox, Orange County, CA) they have been deploying Motorola DCH series set top boxes with CableCARD. On the other hand similar to Cox VA market, trying to get any information on status of Tuning Adapters seems impossible. As a matter of fact just trying to get more information on SDV which was supposed to have been deployed here months ago (a letter sent to customers and certain channels kept out of CableCard lineup) is also going nowhere. As far as I can tell the SDV deployment here seems to have hit a snag and been delayed.

Well Folks, Cox has done it again. I got a letter today from them today concerning programming changes according to the envelope. I was hoping it was information concerning the tuning adapter. Well that was at the bottom of the letter....that it would be issued later this year. However with no date for issuing the adapter, the letter went on to say that they are transferring over 50 channels in the 200-400 series (non HD Channels) to SDV. They offered deals on digital or HD set top boxes so that you could get these channels...big freaking deal since the tivos can't record any of them, Military, Sundance, Science Channel, BBC America are some of them. They take them away before the *&(*(*(** tuning adapter is here. Jerks. I want FiOS.

Well Folks, Cox has done it again. I got a letter today from them today concerning programming changes according to the envelope. I was hoping it was information concerning the tuning adapter. Well that was at the bottom of the letter....that it would be issued later this year. However with no date for issuing the adapter, the letter went on to say that they are transferring over 50 channels in the 200-400 series (non HD Channels) to SDV. They offered deals on digital or HD set top boxes so that you could get these channels...big freaking deal since the tivos can't record any of them, Military, Sundance, Science Channel, BBC America are some of them. They take them away before the *&(*(*(** tuning adapter is here. Jerks. I want FiOS.

Well Folks, Cox has done it again. I got a letter today from them today concerning programming changes according to the envelope. I was hoping it was information concerning the tuning adapter. Well that was at the bottom of the letter....that it would be issued later this year. However with no date for issuing the adapter, the letter went on to say that they are transferring over 50 channels in the 200-400 series (non HD Channels) to SDV. They offered deals on digital or HD set top boxes so that you could get these channels...big freaking deal since the tivos can't record any of them, Military, Sundance, Science Channel, BBC America are some of them. They take them away before the *&(*(*(** tuning adapter is here. Jerks. I want FiOS.

If you could send me a PM, I'd love to get a copy of that letter to pass along to a few interested parties over here.

As it seems to be making the same "offer" (replace your cable card with a HD box from Cox with short term (6 mos) special pricing or a standard digital receiver with short term (1 yr) special pricing) that seems to have failed to impress the FCC the last time (when the FCC decided that pricing needed to be adjusted for the cable card users with reduced services), I wonder what if anything is going to ever bring Cox around.

As it seems to be making the same "offer" (replace your cable card with a HD box from Cox with short term (6 mos) special pricing or a standard digital receiver with short term (1 yr) special pricing) that seems to have failed to impress the FCC the last time (when the FCC decided that pricing needed to be adjusted for the cable card users with reduced services), I wonder what if anything is going to ever bring Cox around.

I don't think so since at least in my market (Cox, Orange County, CA) they have been deploying Motorola DCH series set top boxes with CableCARD. On the other hand similar to Cox VA market, trying to get any information on status of Tuning Adapters seems impossible. As a matter of fact just trying to get more information on SDV which was supposed to have been deployed here months ago (a letter sent to customers and certain channels kept out of CableCard lineup) is also going nowhere. As far as I can tell the SDV deployment here seems to have hit a snag and been delayed.

Cox is deploying the DCH series converters in every Motorola market, just as they are deploying the SA equivalents (8300C,8240C,4250C, and 4240C) in all of their SA markets. They have to, FCC said that unless special dispensation was granted due to technological hardship or financial hardship (which was only really for small companies) all cable companies had to deploy converters with separable security (ie: CableCARD). Once Tru2Way hardware is available to consumers I see the already non-existent support for current CableCARD devices from all cable companies become even less so, if that's actually possible.

As I understand it the whole point of the ruling from the FCC was to try and force providers to work more cooperatively with CableCARD and as such give the end user an experience more on par with that of end users that opted for the set top that the provider was offering. That would in theory create a viable third part set top market place. Until two way communications is possible that will not happen. And since the set tops that Motorola and SA came up with look just like the old ones to the headends, nothing changed.

Unless a converter makes it out of the warehouse without having the card paired to the converter then there's no difference what so ever in how the provider deals with that converter, and if that should happen (at least with Cox in VA) the standard procedure is to reclaim that converter, get a properly paired one in the customer's home, then correct the pairing problem on the back end. In the call center I work in I am one of only a handful of people on the phones that know how to pair a card, and most of that handful I taught how to do it.

There is no parity, and there won't be with this level of the technology if the industry can help it. The providers want out of the CPE business, of that you can be sure, it's a money looser; but they don't want out until Tru2Way (OCAP) hardware is out there, because they don't want to lose the interface control, the branding, and the revenue from PPV/OD ordering.

As for SDV deployment in your area being delayed I don't know why. I know in the Hampton Roads market in VA it's waiting for plant upgrades to be finished. It'll be in my market soon, though. The channel mapping data already has hints to channels that will get it first. Then as has been stated NoVA is getting it in force.

Nice to see that letter, though. It hasn't even been circulated around the call center here, and we're the ones that will be fielding the calls about it, because technical seems to be the catchall of every question the customer has.

Nice to see that letter, though. It hasn't even been circulated around the call center here, and we're the ones that will be fielding the calls about it, because technical seems to be the catchall of every question the customer has.

You know, after dealing with Cox for years, I'm really convinced that they are being run by a bunch of idiots. No offense to you, but I feel like every time I deal with customer service lately that I get the keystone cops.

Course, the last time I had to deal with them I ended up getting a couple months free because they screwed things up so badly (they missed appointments twice and took 2-3 hours screwing with an M-Card before installing two S-Cards.)

With this letter, I'm getting to the end of my rope with Cox. Verizon might be getting a call from me soon.

In the call center I work in I am one of only a handful of people on the phones that know how to pair a card, and most of that handful I taught how to do it.

....

Nice to see that letter, though. It hasn't even been circulated around the call center here, and we're the ones that will be fielding the calls about it, because technical seems to be the catchall of every question the customer has.

It's funny you mention that. I don't doubt it for a minute. i've had the same issue w/ my cablecard lineup both when i first got service and after i added showtime. Only 1 of the cards had the full service. i had to call tech support multiple times to get it resolved.

This time (the showtime addon), the first tech really had no clue what cable cards were about, and i wasted a good 45 minutes on the phone going through reboots. She wanted to have a truck roll. I held off, and called back a week later. This time, i got a guy that knew his stuff. He instantly saw that only 1 of the cards had the full programming, so in 5 minutes he was able to resolve the problem, with no reboot.

While i had him on the phone, i asked him if he knew anything about SDV and the TA. He knew about SDV but not the TA. and then he said something interesting-

that Cust Service or sales knows about new stuff well before tech support, even though most people would think talking to tech support we'd get answers to these questions. And he expressed the same concern you did- that people call tech support and you guys aren't given any info to help people out.

must be frustrating for you guys who actually try to stay on top of things

Well both Cox and Comcast are horrible with customer service. They don’t have to please their customers because they sign these exclusive contracts with the localities. I used to live in Prince William County so I have dealt with both and the grass is not greener on the other side. Competition with Verizon will hopefully make Cox realize that customer service does really matter. I for one will leave Cox for Verizon as soon as FIOS comes to my neighborhood.